Mohd. Ismail is probably the biggest Shammi Kapoor fan from the state. Ismail spent most of his life doing odd jobs at Pahalgam, Gulmarg and other tourists spots that were popular with Bombay filmwallas. He met lot of stars, had himself photographed with quite a few of them. But Shammi Kapoor remained a lifelong favorite. While most of Kashmir Media was a bit quite on passing away of Shammi Kapoor, Ismail was publishing Remembrances. Ran into Ismail at my sister’s wedding reception. He was supplying water.
Not as famous as the giant gold digging ants of our state, these guys scavenge the drains of Jammu city’s Jain Bazaar for gold that inevitable finds its way into the drains while being processed in shops. The drains of Jain bazaar are leased out to various people for gold digging.
I like the way Jammu looks in winter. Last year, the neighbours were a couple of college kids from Drass who played cricket on the roof-top all day long. This years it’s the family of a stone-crusher worker from Kargil.
With her grand-daughter, Subril. She was the one who started the conversation.
‘Aap ka Naam kya hai’.
That according to her grandfather is the best she can manage in urdu till now.
Believes it is right that the girls should be married young.
‘If boys go ‘haywire’ no one asks anything, but the world stops in case of girls.’
I have no clue why he picked this subject to open talks with me but I believe he must have been talking to my father lately.
Working on a necklace of beads and a sweater for her grand-daughter
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The boy likes to enact chest beating of Muharram.
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Jammu and Kashmir by Somnath Dhar National Book Trust, India Second Edition, 1982 Pages 200 Price Rs. 17 (bought for Rs. 200 at ebay from a Jaipur based seller of )
“Tell me what land can boast such treasures?
Is aught so fair, is aught so sweet?
Hail! Paradise of endless pleasure!
Hail! Beautiful and beloved Kashmir!”
~ Iranian Poet “Toghra” of “Ispahan”
When I first started writing about Kashmir I came across a lot of writing by Kashmiri people. Most of it repeating the same old stories. But it was writings of Somnath Dhar that I found really interesting and engageable. Interesting – because he had cataloged folk songs and folk tales. Engageable – because when he writes that Abdul Ahad Azad mentions a series of articles entitled “Mahmud Gami’s Yusuf Zulekhan” that appeared in a German magazine in 1895, you search online and find that the articles and partial translations were done by Karl Friedrich Burkhard. When he quotes an Iranian poet on Kashmir, you find that the lines may have been part of Ta’rif-e Kashmir-e Toghra. His writings offer a process of learning. [He was one of the teachers of T.N. Madan] His writings, which till recently I had only accessed online, were certainly an inspiration for me. Often while looking for a piece of information, I ended up coming across something written by him [like for the post on ‘Origin of Kashmiri Houseboat‘]. Finally, I have managed to get my hands on one of his many works on Kashmir.
Somnath Dhar’s Jammu and Kashmir (first published in 1977, re-published in 1982, 1992 and 1999) is supposed to be a beginner’s guide to Kashmir but somehow in just around 200 pages Somnath Dhar manages to offer a lot more than a brief snapshot of the state. he manages to cover almost everything. The content from this book is still used, re-used ad-lib.
In fourteen chapters Somnath Dhar covers People, Language, History, Heritage, Music, Songs, Folklore, Literature, Poems, Drama and Monuments. In addition it even offers details on government developmental plans, and numbers stuff like this population breakdown of the state:
Jains? Probably from Jammu. Religion not stated? Probably too poor to care or probably too educated to care. That’s why I like reading stuff like this. There are also subtle lessons on how various historical narratives are used in a grand ‘conflict’ to make seemingly innocuous but potent comments in favour of a political position. It’s a practice that Kashmiri are still finding too addictive and hard to resist. That too interests me. The myth-making.
The best part of the book is perhaps the songs from Leh and Dogra Land and of course, Kashmir.
From Leh we hear Ladakhis singing the song of Zorawar Singh’s wife:
I do not wish to eat bread received from the sinful northerners
I do not wish to drink water received from the sinful northerners
Amidst the inhabitants of this land I have no friends and relations…
When arriving at the Zoji-la-Pass, my fatherland can be seen…
Although I can see my fatherland, I shall not arrive there…
In Jammu a woman sings:
Tera miga ladga i manda, O gadda, tera miga lagda i manda, Eh Patwari migi khat rehyum liki dinda, sau sau karnian Chanda. Kehsi banai Rama Jange di Chakri
I am sick of separation, my love,
I am sick of separation,
I entreat the Patwari again and again,
To write a letter for me, but he refuses,
So you leave the army and return home.
Why, O God Rama, have you created a permanent institution like the Army?
In Kashmir girls dance while singing:
O you must tell me
Where my boy has gone.
Is he a fountain in life’s garden,
Or, a well of nectar, sweet and delicious?
Another thing of my interest, description of Kashmir by the early western visitors. People who pronounced the name of this place as “Cassimere, Chismeer or Ouexmir”.
In addition the book offers there views of Kashmir:
The tea Kashmiris brew in the Samovar is called Kahva. they love to sip it in the orchards when fruits are in blossom. (Courtesy S.P. Sahni)
Kashmiris open a bottle of cold-drink at Chasmeshahi. 2008.
In the post ‘The Romantic Kashmir, 1906‘, I identified the below given image from 1945 as that of Gadhadhar Temple Srinagar.
The Gadhadhar Temple in Srinagar actually looks like this back in 1906:
I assumed that in next couple of decades it may have changed a bit. So made a connection between an unidentifiable location and an identifiable location. It turns out I was wrong.
Man Mohan Munshi Ji pointed out the mistake. Gadhadhar Temple in Srinagar still looks pretty much the same. The discussion lead me to an interesting fact that there is in fact a Gadhadhar Temple in Jammu too. It seems Dogras built twin temples separated by geographical locations and just next to their two seats of power.
The following photographs and description were sent by Man Mohan Munshi Ji of Gadadhar temple in Jammu.
View of Gadadhar Temple Jammu from the south-western gate of Mubarak Mandi . (old Secretariat). Temple is located on the first floor and ground floor houses some shops and offices.
Front view of the Gadadhar temple on the first floor
Statue of the deity inside the temple, note the Gadha in the hand of the deity
The filled up tank in front of the temple used by Dewan Badrinath School as play ground.
Note the western gate of the old Secretariat Jammu on the right side
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Update: I now believe the original image to be of a Jain temple in Calcutta. Check original post (Kashmir in 1945) for updates.
View from rooftop a few months after years 2008 Amarnath Land transfer Syapa. Febuary 2009.
War drums
‘Bhaiya, you won’t believe what we did today. It was such a riot,’ my little cousin sister excitedly informed me over phone. Hearing this, I expected her to tell me how she and her younger sister pulled a fast one on someone, their latest adventure in mischief. As she started to tell me the story, as I laughed, a feeling of deja vu gripped me, a familiar sinking feeling, something akin to sadness.
‘It was evening. We were on the rooftop, reading out books. Suddenly, we heard distant shrill metallic sounds, like some people beating steel plates. Soon the sound got louder, got nearer. Other people had picked up the call. The sound was now everywhere. It was party time. So we too got our self a thali, a chamach and joined in the party.’
People were beating utensils as a form of solidarity with cause, in protest. So my little sisters too had taken part in it, the agitation. And they were not alone. She went on to tell me how neigbours would visit our house looking for my Uncle, seeking attendance of at least one family member in the daily rally. The rallying call apparently was: ‘Pandit Ji, this is for you too. All of your loss. No more loss. Now we stand. Together.’ My Uncle went along a couple of times, but most of the times only Rotis rolled out by my aunt and grandmother went out to the agitators.
My cousin who was back then in 8th Standard, ended her story on an even happier note, ‘Do you know we haven’t been to the school for about two month?’
We walk along a line on Möbius strip of time and memories.
Back in 1990, I was in 3rd Standard and lost an academic year because schools in the small city of Jammu had no space for hordes of new “migrant” kids arriving from Kashmir. And once I got admission, I again sat through a class that I had already mastered. Back then, I realized school could be a violent place. Unlike schools in Kashmir, school violence in Jammu was epidemic. Every second day, you could watch someone have his skull smashed by a brick, every third day you could hear about some student getting knifed, and every forth day was a holiday or a half-day due to bomb blasts. Post a bomb-blast came shutdown, bandh and a long walk back from school to a one roomed rented place called home. Maybe I exaggerate, but then my memory association with events of those early years works in a way that may someday make sense to someone who grew up in blast ravaged Karachi or Lahore or Islamabad of year 2010, or any blast prone area of any era.
Television premiere of Chalbaaz on Doordarshan, day the deadliest Matador blast happened. I imagined a snub nosed green matador, a muknas. Everyone of it must have been listening to the 4-tracked stereophonic ‘welcome to Jammu’ anthem, ‘Dil Diwana Bin Sajna kay Manay Na’. It must have been a usual hot day and every one in the bus must have been wet with sweating. Thinking of heat and wetness of others, someone must have sat near the seat next to the missing door, the conductor seat. Just below the seat, next to the cranky speaker, any one could place the bomb. It could be anywhere and everywhere. Release of Karan Arjun, blast in Apsara theater. Three days after Republic day blast, a head of a victim found on the rooftop of government apartments next to Bakshi Stadium. Blast at Raghunath temple, three school mates cut shot their ‘school-bunk’ adventure, sneak back to class room laughing, they were sitting only a tea stall away from the blast site, they thought it was a tyre-burst. Listening to tyre-burst, sitting on a wooden bench scrawled with ‘Poonam+Nikhil’, I was hoping it was a bomb blast, and praying the school goes off. Reading messages in buses about ‘Agyat Vastu’ and finding them funny. Hearing stoic announcements in Metro about ‘Unknown Objects, radios, transistors ‘, I assume we are already well trained, we are ready for what is coming, ‘unknown’, trained for life by death.
I was in Jammu a couple of months later. Things were back to what is deemed normal. Happenings of previous few months had left little remains, only a ‘Andolan’ graffiti here and there, and echos. At home, the Gujjar milkman had picked a new habit of frequently ending sentences with, ‘You people were right. They are wrong.’ He must have been repeating it, having himself heard for last couple of months now. Old Massi, our Gujjar neighbour was still looking after her growing household and house, number by number, floor by floor, sq ft by sq ft. Her progenies were now running a playschool-cum-creche, and one of her grand-daughters was now a Dentist. Her two grand-sons from her daughter too didn’t turn out too bad. When the kids were young, Massi got then a Mudarris, a Koran teacher. The boys grovelled, recited back, cried, recited back, picked their nose, recited back, ran helter skelter, recited aloud. Massi, the designate observer of their afternoon study session, profusely apologizing to the teacher would usually get them by their ear and back in front of him. But some days she too found their antics funny and would laugh her guts out. Funny faces behind teacher’s back is always funny. Now these kids had have grown up. Although I suspect their grades in school were still low, their politeness score had gone high. ‘Kab aaye Bhaiya!Aur…’ an infrequent visitor never gets unacknowledged. Massi seemed content, content enough for you to imagine her offering a grey teeth blaring smile carrying a heap of fresh green grass on her head for the young goat tied outside her kitchen, her hair henna-dyed hair, burnt brown, peeking from the corner of a fluorescent pink dupatta covering her head, held in place by her one hand, the other hand carrying a dhrati.
‘So, who did you vote for?’
‘BJP, of course.’ My Uncle answered, a bit surprised at the stupidity of my question.
‘And so did everyone from our family, including you.’ He added.
View from the roof was tinted saffron. There was a BJP flag fluttering on the roof of my Jammu house. There were flags fluttering from the rooftop of every second house. I started to open the knots of the threads that tied the flag firmly to a television antenna.
Later back in Delhi, when the results of the election came, I was in for a surprise. BJP had the seat lost from my area.
Aftermath.
‘It’s all funny business. I remember when I was a kid, this one time I had a big fight with my father. He had voted for Congress. And I was a BJP kid. He reason he gave was that the guy he selected had done lot of good work in the area. I would have none of it. BJP back then was the best thing that could ever happen to a school going kid. BJP was the Chutti Party.’
‘Chutti Uncle,’ I inadvertently interrupted my Marwari friend’s monologue triggered by my stupored monologue. I was back in Delhi talking about my experience with two of my friends.
‘What?’
He didn’t get it. There’s no reason why he should.
‘Nothing. Continue. Continue.
‘Listen, Kashmiri. So BJP was naturally the greatest party in the world for me. Every second day they were on street enforcing ye Bandh, wo Bandh. So no school. And on top of it, they were going to build The temple. They were alive, electric, like tube light, other dead or old, like Bajaj Bulb. All shiny. Apparently that wasn’t enough for my father. So we fought. I may even have been a bit embarrassed of his action. It was a crazy time. I now see his point. I was too young to understand all this back then. He has worked hard all his life. Coming from a village and making a life in this city.’
Every once in a while, my friend goes back to visit his village, a place called Behal in Rajasthan. His ancestors were village grocers. They have a family temple in the village. They still have some land holding, taken care of by local guys tied to his family for generations. Poor local guys who in death are mourned like a death in the family.
‘At least you guys get to visit your village as and when you like. You have a place to go back to. In our case…’
‘In your case what? Don’t start again. What is your case? You too are here right now drinking beer. Happy. Listening to some ‘Bhawgwan knows what’ song by a Chinki band.’
‘It’s a Diamonds and Rust. Baez. Manipur.’
‘Talking nonsense. I think BJP still is great. Everyone in my family votes for it. Everyone once in a while we need to push the chain and flush the system. They are do’er while others are all duffers. Talk and more talk.’
My other Marwari friend finally had had enough of our drunk talk. A distant cousin of my monologue buddy, he too traces his origin to Behal, only his ancestors moved to Jorhat near Guwahati in Assam where they have land holding leased out to companies for years. His family moved to Delhi when he was a kid because of ULFA condition but mostly because of his then, strangely enough, Asthma condition. Why would anyone move to Delhi to cure Asthma? I once tried to get an answer but he ended up talking about ULFA. For every JKLF story that I would come up with, he would come up with a ULFA story. I knew what was coming. He too wanted to be listened.
‘You think you have seen everything. How do you thing ULFA lost its teeth? My father knew all the guys who went on to be local ULFA leaders. It was all business. This one time…’
By the end of the year, friend of mine moved back to Guwahati where he now sells iron at almost thrice the profit margin at which my Marwari friend is able to sell in Delhi.
I understand the math.
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Photograph was taken using the camera lent out to me by my friend from Jorhat. This was my first D-SLR camera.
